Republicans shift focus from repeal to Obama health law’s impact on jobs and cost to businesses

Jon Ward

Jon Ward covers the White House and national politics for The Daily Caller. He covered the last two years of George W. Bush's presidency and the first year of Barack Obama's presidency for The Washington Times. Prior to moving to national politics, Jon worked for the Times' city desk and bureaus in Virginia and Maryland, covering local news and politics, including the D.C. sniper shootings and subsequent trial, before moving to state politics in Maryland. He and his wife have two children and live on Capitol Hill. || <a href="mailto:jw@dailycaller.com">Email Jon</a>

“The president’s new health care law is already hurting our economy,” read a release from the office of House Minority Leader John Boehner, Ohio Republican.

The release cited “a long list of employers including AT&T, AK Steel, 3M, Caterpillar, Deere and Valero Energy that have felt an immediate squeeze because of ObamaCare’s job-killing tax increases and health-care cost hikes.”

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce Tuesday publicly tacked away from the repeal movement.

“While some discuss repeal, the U.S. Chamber believes a more effective approach is to work through all available and appropriate avenues — regulatory, legislative, legal and political —to fix the bill’s flaws and minimize its harmful impacts,” said Tom Donohue, the chamber’s president and chief executive, in an opinion piece distributed to reporters.

Though Obama and Democrats gained some bounce in public opinion polls after passing health care, Republicans have taken heart in numbers over the last few days.

Democrats heralded the results of a USA Today/Gallup poll immediately after the bill’s passage that showed 49 percent approval and 40 percent disapproval. Those numbers represent an outlier, and another USA Today/Gallup poll released this week showed large numbers of Americans have concerns about the bill’s costs and its impact on quality of health care.

About 65 percent of those polled said the new law will expand the government’s role in health care too far, another 64 percent said it will cost too much, and 58 percent said it won’t do enough to curb rising costs.

Of the 50 percent opposed, 86 percent said they supported undoing the president’s changes, with only 9 percent opposing that route.

Conn Carroll, assistant director of strategic communications at the conservative Heritage Foundation, said, “Repeal is still the goal.”

“I just think conservatives are being honest about the fact that since Obama isn’t going to sign a law that repeals his signature accomplishment, that repeal is just not going to happen till at least 2013,” Carroll said.

“So yes, conservatives are going to be highlighting all of the costs to business and the thousands of lost jobs Obamacare will cause. And, yes, public opinion will only continue to sour on this bill. But the goal is still the same: repeal.”

Democrats will hold them to it, said Hari Sevugan, Democratic National Committee spokesman.

“Either you’re for repeal or you’re not. Republicans have made it clear that they are,” Sevugan said. “That means they now not only support the idea of handing our health-care system back to insurance companies, but want to impose the largest health-care tax hike on middle-class families and small businesses in history.”

Same old GOP mentality – we’re the GOP; we’re losers who get along by going along. When it’s our turn we want to be able to count on the centrist Democrats to formulate policy, so we aren’t going to do what the people want, we are going to do what we want.

L-O-S-E-R-S

Time for the Tea Party movement to go its own way. We will never be more than the doormat of the Republican Party. They will take our money, take our votes and wipe their butts with us and put us in jail when we dare to have any morals that aren’t their phony morals.

Am I missing something here? We don’t send our politicians to Washington so they can snip at the President’s heels and whine about what they think he is or is not doing. We pay our legislators to legislate. Work. Earn your keep.

Who in the world told them that they can make a living attacking the President and we are suppose to pay for their salaries. When they quit their jobs then they can spend as much time as they want whining like little children fighting over toys in a sandbox!

When will Americans start asking then to put forth their ideas. Where is their contribution to anything. What have they been doing over the last two years?

I’m with you Anniebanannie! And can I add that they know damn well that they can’t get anything repealed. They need 67 votes to overturn the President. They are praying on the folks who don’t know how these things work. GET TO WORK REPUBLICANS! Like this President or not at least he is working. The more the people in Congress scream and shout the more they show that the President is the only adult between them.

anniebanannie

Oh, hey honey, you ain’t “with me”.. you ain’t even close to being “with me”. You know those politicians your griping about because they nip at the president’s heels” Well, I’m the one yellin’ “Sic ‘em!”

“praying on the folks who don’t know how these things work” Maybe you flunked civics class, but I got an A.

“President is the only adult” You mean the guy that was out on the campaign trail again today using sarcasm and juvenile playground taunts to make his points? If that’s acting like an adult, I would rather have an eighth grade dance king as my leader.

oeno

Ok. Here’s an idea. Waxman obviously doesn’t understand math. Let’s copy him but be the opposite.

“What do you mean they expensed it over several years? What do you mean we’ve been paying them millions for the past half decade in addition to their full tax write-off for benefits? What do you mean that they are using this as a one time write-off and then telling their employees that they may not get those benefits. They may have to go to Medicare Part D as it should have been written? Oh well. It makes a nice commercial.”